It was great to read Chicks Rule, AVNetworks’ piece on women in the AV industry. The content and profiles offered there are important reminders that diverse perspectives, approaches and backgrounds are essential for the growth and evolution of any industry.
In the article, Helen Meyer of Meyer Sound said it best:
In general, I think women tend to show a better understanding of the value of a diverse workplace and strive to shape their organizations accordingly. Innovation often comes from teams with a mixture of different skills and backgrounds.
Amen.
As we have been in consumer electronics game for quite some time, we can recall the days when women in the workforce were few and far between. In the 1974 Gene Hackman film The Conversation, there is a scene that takes place at a CE trade show. It is evident that the entire workforce portrayed, with the exception of the proverbial “booth babes,” is male. That scene did not begin to feel somewhat out of date until somewhat recently, and that recent shift in demographics is a good thing for the health and future of the industry at large.
Terra remains a relatively small, boutique company, but we doubled our staffing this year and we have been expanding the network of contractors we work alongside to grow this company—to make better and greater products. While we are primarily concerned with hiring the best people for the job, we are happy to look back on this year of growth and see that by the end of this year, nearly one in two of those who work for or along with our company will be women. Again, we are most concerned with hiring the best people for the jobs that need doing, but we will surely benefit from including into our approach a wide range of inputs, approaches and perspectives.